Cell Number Eight
by Sunbird Riding Shotgun
Summary: Nate was waiting for IYS to pay his ransom. Eliot was waiting to die. Neither expected sharing a tiny cell in a prison outside Cairo would forge the foundation of a relationship that would last the years.
1. Chapter 1

**Notes:** This is my backstory for Nate and Eliot used in this verse and probably the other stories unless stated otherwise.  
Cyber cookies to anyone geeky enough to catch the LotR fanfic reference.

* * *

**Cell Number Eight**

* * *

It's strange how an epiphany in the middle of a fight can make time seem to slow down.

Eliot Spencer had been in some run down slum on the outskirts of Cairo, trying to run a job when he probably should be in the hospital, in the middle of a fight with a bunch of guys who were the reason why the emphasis was on the word trying. His ribs had been screaming at him that they were broken again. The old wounds left by a crime lord's torturers not a month ago were reopening. His entire body was on fire from pushing himself way to far and he was trying to gather some of that fire and desperation to just survive, that deadly survival instinct that carried him through when fights got tough, when it hit him.

He didn't really care anymore.

Eliot Spencer had had enough.

Time seemed to slow down. He coughed, spit blood onto the ground, and breathed a moment. He didn't know why he was fighting anymore, why he was even doing this job other than that it was a job and that at the ripe old age of twenty-five his life had already revolved around doing jobs for over a decade. He was his work and he had to keep working or face the fact that he didn't have anything left beside the job anymore. His sister had disowned him once she found out how he put her through college, his mother was dead, his father had been dead, he had no home, no friends besides Willie and those folk but Ammie had made it clear he wasn't welcome any more now that she was getting married.

That left him with work. A different hotel room every night, patching himself up in the bathroom because he was too afraid to go to the ER, suffering through nightmares, flashbacks, insomnia, and god knows what else because he couldn't take time off to deal with the fact that he'd spent three months in hell.

What the hell was he doing this for?

He didn't know. He didn't care. He was tired.

Eliot Spencer was done.

He was done, he surrendered, he was ready to retire, turn in his non-existent badge and gym membership and go to that big bar fight in the sky.

He didn't even feel the blow that took him down.

**oOo**

Nathan Ford was not having a good day. It had started out mostly alright, a call from his wife and very energetic year old son always was a perfect cure for waking up alone in a strange hotel. He was on a job but he should have been home in a couple of days. He just needed to track down a couple people, ask a few more questions, con a fellow or two and he'd be on his happy way back home.

How that day ended with him coming to as he was being half dragged, half carried through the halls of some dark prison complex he would have to address later if only to add it to his list of things he was never doing again.

He played possum, not even beginning to know what situation he'd landed himself in and not wanting to attract attention until he had some idea of what he was dealing with. He'd been stripped to his waist and his shoes and socks were gone but it could be worse.

Okay, so being dragged half naked towards god knows where couldn't be much worse, but it could still be worse.

He didn't know how long it had been before a door was opened and he was tossed into a cell. He let himself collapse onto the floor.

He waited for the door to shut and lock and the gaurds to walk away before he climbed to his feet, shaking himself off and checking himself over for injuries. After ascertaining that he had a mild concussion and only a few minor wounds from a scuffle he started examining his prison.

It was pretty much what came to mind at the word "cell" in this part of the world. Dirt floor, stone walls and ceiling, musty, cold, small, and damp. There was also a rather nasty smell that suggested there were probably some nice specimen of vermin he didn't want to get too acquainted with lurking around. It was hard to tell, the cell was pretty dark. Lit mostly by the light leaking in through the barred window slit in the cell door.

Nate took a hesitant step forward and nearly knocked over some kind of metal bucket that sloshed when his foot hit it. It was a bucket of water. While down to examine it Nate found an empty bucket with a foul smell that suggested it's purpose, and a small tray with a bowl of what felt like it might be some kind of barely based food substance and what made him thank god, a couple of matches.

It seemed like someone had already put food and water in his cell for him, strange since this wasn't exactly a Hilton, but matches suggested there might be some kind of lighting source that needed to be lit.

Carefully striking one of the matches Nate used the dim light it gave to look around his cell, locating a small candle sitting on a stool near a corner. He grabbed the other match and crossed to it quickly, hoping not to lose it in the gloom once he shook the match out.

He was so focused on getting lasting light it wasn't until the wick of the candle glowed to life that Nate noticed the soft raspy breathing not two feet from him and realized that what he'd stumbled into might not have been meant for him.

He turned slowly, nightmare scenarios forming in his mind as the light of the candle finally let him see the being he was sharing his cell with.

He was not expecting it to be a small man in his early twenties who watched Nate with pain glazed eyes. The food and water was probably meant for this man but it took barely a glance to realize he was too weak to cross the room to get to it. He was flushed with a fever, his bare chest crisscrossed with burns and lacerations and scars that suggested torture that left terror chasing it's way down Nate's spine.

Nate tried not to consider that, focusing on his young cell mate and the fact the boy looked like he was mounting death's front porch and getting ready to knock.

As Nate stood there, in the darkness, completely at a loss for what to do or what was going on, completely without a plan he did what he did best: made one quick decision and let the plan form as he went along. He could worry about what was going to come, sit shivering in the darkness for hours until fear drove him half mad, or he could try to save this man's life and maybe help himself in the process. Surely this man would be able to tell him something about his current situation.

Nate put the candle back onto it's stool, fetched the water bucket, tore piece off the bottom of his pant leg and sat himself next to his patient. "Hello. Do you speak English? My name is Nathan, I'm going to try to help you." He didn't get a response save those pained blue eyes closing and his head turning away.

Nate swallowed hard, there had been a moment when even though the man hadn't said a word his face said once thing perfectly clear. "Leave me alone. Just let me die in peace." Nate's plan faltered for a moment and he wondered if maybe he should do just that. He didn't know this man and god knows he didn't know what he'd been through.

The man's head lolled to the side and it was clear he'd drifted back into unconsciousness. For a long moment Nate just sat there, candle light flickering across skin that was too pale from prolonged captivity and stretched over a body that was far too thin, marred by scars from fights and torture that had to have been going on for quite some time for there were many scars that seemed to show the earliest wounds had already healed. It looked more like the body of an old man or some victim of a death camp then anything else.

But with those dead and pained eyes closed the face looked young. Somehow everything that came together made him look even younger than the twenty something he probably was. He looked like a kid who should be worrying about college and girls and the dumb things college kids worried about. He shouldn't be dieing in some god forsaken hellhole

Nate wasn't even sure when in that line of thought he'd started moving again. Cleaning infected injuries, a second rag torn, wet and laid on the man's forehead to fight the fever as best Nate could figure out how.

Chances were this kid would die that night but Nate would what he could.

Nate didn't know how long he worked. When he had nothing left to do besides wait and hope his patient pulled through he blew out the candle, leaned against the wall and let himself drift into a restless sleep.

The change of light was what woke him. A dim light filling the dark cell stirred Nate from his sleep. Shafts, only a few inches in diameter, were cut into the wall near the ceiling and went at a slope to ground level offering a tiny bit of natural light into the cell.

It took Nate a few minutes to wake up enough to remember where he was and what was going on but as soon as he did he turned to the man from the night before.

His eyes were closed, the flush of fever gone and for one moment Nate feared he'd passed away during the night. Hesitantly Nate reached out to feel for a pulse. The man's eyes flew open. They were still foggy with fever and pain but there was lucidity there.

And fear.

"Glad to see you lived through the night." Nate said, turning slowly toward his patient, feeling the blows he'd taken when he was captured the day before making him stiff. "I was thrown in here last night, you might not remember it. I saw you were hurt and did what I could." The man just looked at him, those cloudy blue eyes somehow alert all the same, looking for danger.

The night before Nate had seen the marks of a hard life; burns and lacerations and scars from fights. There were older scars too, marks telling of a childhood no one should have endured and left little wonder in Nate's mind why this man had little trust for a kind stranger.

Nate met those blue eyes steadily. The scars, new and old, as good as told Nate his cell-mate's profession: thief or a thug of some kind, maybe even a retrieval specialist early in his career and in over his head. They were on opposite sides of the line.

Which begged to reason why he was still concerned about making this man better?

If Nate was honest with himself, and he always tried to be, it was because the older scars. With a year old son waiting for him to get home Nate couldn't help but wonder a little if maybe a different family was all the difference between who Sam would grow up to be and this young man.

Nate was too realistic to think he could "save" this man, or show him the error in his ways and convince him to lead a honest life. Salvation was Paul's job.

But that made him remember what Paul always reminded him whenever Nate's work came up. "Remember that Javier was the honest man but it was Jean Valjean that was a good man." An officer of the law was an honest man but it was the thief he spent his whole life chasing that was the better man.

_"He treated me like any other, he gave me his trust, he called me brother. What spirit comes to move my life? Is there another way to go?" _The line came back to him after the years and Nate remembered Paul's favorite part. Jean Valjean better man because that one night, when Jean Valjean was young and broken a holy man showed him kindness, treated him like a human.

The man was looking at him with a expression somewhere between confusion and apathy before turning his head away.

Well, too much philosophy first thing in the morning had always been a bad idea.

Nate got up, stretched, and found the bucket of water from the night before. "If you don't remember my name's Nathan. Are you thirsty?"

**oOo**

Eliot was pretty hazy. He wasn't quite sure how long he'd been lingering between lucidity and death but he'd faded in and out more than a few times before something had changed. He'd faded in to find the cell dark in night but then something had changed.

There was sounds and just when Eliot was beginning to wonder if rats had come to see if he was nice and dead yet someone lit a candle.

He'd watched for a few short moments, trying to determine if the man was just his mind taking a vacation, if someone was actually there, or if this was what death was like.

The man spoke to him, talking about helping him and all Eliot could do was close his eyes and look away. He didn't want help, even in the off chance this guy was actually going to try to do anything but hurt him. He just… he was tired.

He was ready for this to be over.

When he faded in again it was morning. The burning pain had gone down. He felt more human, more lucid, connected to his body and the world around him like he hadn't been for awhile. Time had passed and he understood it. Something had changed but he wasn't sure what.

He'd seen the man then, some stranger in the cell that had had no intruders beyond the dayily he'd had enough witts about him at one point to name room-service. Memories of long imprisonment in Nishka's dungeons sprang up and Eliot wondered if whoever seemed to have forgotten he was rotting away down here had remembered now.

But then the man spoke. He had helped Eliot. He had tried to treat him as best he could and seemed to actually want to make him better.

Eliot was too fuzzy to really consider the implications and everything, and he was too tired to care right then.

But when that man, Nathan, asked if he was thirsty Eliot could only nod.

Ten minutes later, when Nathan had helped him take a drink and was rechecking his injuries with hands that were gentle in a way Eliot had almost forgotten Eliot started to fade out again.

As he closed his eyes and let unconsciousness sweep over him again his last hazy thought was that somehow this was an honest man. There was something about this man he could almost trust.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

* * *

For more than a day the boy continued to fade in and out of consciousness, lucidity only returning occasionally.

He didn't speak, Nate half wondered if the man was hoping Nate would just give up and leave him to die. Nate might have been tempted if there was anything else to do but stare at the four walls and wonder what would happen to him. Nate would be lying there, thinking about Sam and Maggie and then the guards would tromp by outside and Nate would freeze in terror that maybe they were coming to do to him what they'd done to the boy. The guards would tromp on and Nate's rattled mind would forsake all thought and he'd go check on his patient one more time.

Nate did try to reach out to the man, in those few period when the man was awake and a little alert. Nate would keep a running one-sided dialogue in the hopes of drawing some kind of response from the man. When he received a glare sometime near dusk Nate considered it a small step in the right direction.

The second day dawned with the man in a little better health, his lucid moments stretching longer and his fever had finally broken.

He also didn't glare when Nate checked his wounds and he seemed to have gotten over the fact he needed help to eat the meager meal porridge they were given twice a day. It was small steps but somewhere in those two days the man seemed to have, if only subconsciously, regained something of a desire to get better and live.

But as night fell the second time and Nate helped the man sit up enough and attempt to manage to feed himself the man still hadn't said a word. Nate was beginning to wonder if the man had gone mute from the trauma.

The candle was nearly burned out and there was no sign of another one so when darkness fell Nate made his way to the straw and burlap pallet that served as his "bed" and tried to fall asleep thinking of the home he should have been flying home to tonight.

Over the years Nate had learned there were few people as unpredictable as thieves and conmen. You could spend your whole life studying them and he was pretty sure they would still manage to surprise you with some insane twist in the end.

So it really should have come as less of a surprise when on the third morning, while Nate was trying to eat the foul concoction that had shown up as breakfast without throwing up, that the other man casually broke his silence.

"The key is ta relax your throat, it helps suppress the gag reflex."

Thick, congealed, meal-porridge was spewed across the floor and wall Nate had been facing as he sputtered with surprise and reaction to the way it was obvious by the man's voice the sentence had been meant. Nate turned to see a Cheshire cat smile spreading across the man's face taking some of the tired out of his eyes.

"You know this from experience?" Nate asked, wiping at his mouth. The stuttered, embarrassed, denial and surprise at Nate's quick recovery lifted a little of the tension away. "So you do talk I see. Just waiting for an opening."

"The way you've been talkin' my ears off it was hard. You gab like a gossip Nathan." Eliot finished the last of his food with a long, somewhat disgusted, sigh and let himself relax against the wall he was leaning against. He was making fast progress but he could barely sit up under his own power. He closed those clear blue eyes and let out another long sigh. "'names Eliot. Now can you let a guy get some sleep?"

"By all means" Nate said with a small grin, gathering up the bowls to be put by the door.

**oOo**

It was three days and Eliot still didn't know what to make of his cell mate. The guy was taking care of him, being gentle, patient, even friendly. There was no reason for him to be. What was in it for him? What did Nathan hope to gain from all of this?

As the days had passed and Eliot's mind became more lucid he started to just maybe consider that it was because Nathan was a good person. As unlikely as it seemed Nathan might just be doing it because he was a good guy.

It was a concept Eliot had a surprisingly hard time wrapping his mind around.

It was strange, but around the time he first considered that he noticed for the first time since he'd been here he was trying. Eliot was responding to the care, trying to get better rather than just fade away like he had been. He still wasn't sure entirely why, except that somewhere in between dreams and waking he'd started going over all his escape tactics and things he'd learned to see if they could be adapted.

He wouldn't admit, even in his head, what he was doing that for yet.

So Eliot laid and waited and tried to focus on getting better and figuring out his strange companion.

Nate talked when ever he knew Eliot was awake. It had grated on Eliot's nerves at first but after a while he started to find it strangely soothing. It broke the silence and gave him something to think about besides the round and round of "whats the point" "wonder what Ammie and her new husband are doing" and bad memories that had been keeping him mind occupied.

The thing Nate talked about most often was Sam and Maggie, Nate's wife and year old son. Eliot was pretty sure if Nate had had his wallet Eliot would have been treated to plenty of pictures already but it just gave Nate a reason to describe them to the ceiling and a listening Eliot.

Nate told stories about Sam. How Sam was already running about at barely one. How Maggie and all her mother friends had a huge birthday party for their one year olds that had really been more of a celebration of surviving their first years as parents, how everything was perfect even if Nate had to travel for work.

Nate also talked a lot about art and crime and it wasn't long before Eliot put it together that he was a con man or an investigator. It was a good explanation of why he was here. Eliot listened to those stories and picked up a few tricks along the way.

But somtime during the third night Nate had stopped talking and Eliot made the decision to break his own silence. The man had done a lot for him. Eliot would a least give him a reprieve from that fear laced behind his words.

If Eliot did it in his own little way to get rid of any awkwardness early on then who could really blame him?

And so somehow, here they were, Eliot pretending to sleep against a wall and Nate moving about the cell doing god only knew what. It wasn't until Nate sat close to Eliot and started doing something on the floor that Eliot cracked his eyes open a little to try to see what he was up to.

Nate had a pile of the straw from his bedding and a few small piles of various shaped stones and pieces of wax. He watched as Nate used the straw to make a sort of box shaped grid on the floor before setting out the stones in two lines on the sides of the grid nearest himself and Eliot.

When Nate was done he started moving the stones one at a time in odd, apparently haphazard movements occasionally taking a piece off the the board.

After a long time had passed and Nate was down to only a few pieces Eliot finally gave up. "What are you doing?"

"Playing chess." Nate answered.

"Right. Don't cha need those little horses and castles for that?"

Nate looked up, grinned a little and shook his head. "I'm making do. You wanna play a game?"

"Do I look like I play chess?" Eliot asked. Sure he'd heard of the game and if pressed he might be able to recall how the pieces moved.

Some of them.

"I can teach you if you want." Nate offered, already moving to put the pieces back on the board. "It's not like we have a lot else to do in here."

Eliot grunted his agreement and let Nate go ahead as he explained the rules and pieces and pointed out how to identify which one was which and how they moved. It took a few minutes but in a surprisingly short time Eliot got over the fact this was a game geeks played. It was interesting, hard. It made his head hurt but in the good way.

Even though Nate beat him so soundly that if it had been a fight Eliot would have been well and truly dead Eliot was the one to start setting up the pieces. "How didya do that?" He asked.

"Strategy." Nate said with a grin, putting his own pieces back into place. "The key to chess is planning ahead. You don't think about your next move, you think about your next ten moves, more even." The board was set back up and Nate moved. "Like this. I move my piece here to open the way for my bishop to get out. My next move if my knight and after that, unless you've done something drastic I'll castle my king and my defenses are set up for a long game."

Eliot moved a pawn.

"Why did you move that?" Eliot asked.

"So I could get my queen into play?" Eliot said, trying not to sound as confused as he was.

"You tend to keep her out of play for the first few moves."

"But she's your strongest piece! Why not use her?"

"You've left your king open to an attack from a bishop a few moves down the line." Nate said, tapping the space left open. "And it's not about strong pieces. If you want to win at chess you plan ahead." Nate made his next move, moving his bishop and saying "check".

The game was two moves in and already not going well.

**oOo**

They were on their sixth game by the time dinner was delivered and Eliot was picking up the game with speed that surprised Nate. In honesty Nate had figured his cell mate as the Muscle type. Strong, fast, with plenty of street smarts but not too bright.

But the afternoon of chess had shown Eliot had an astounding learning curve, like every move he or Nate had made had taught him something about the game. Nate had started off going pretty easy on Eliot. More and more he was having to be more careful. Being cocky had nearly cost him game number five.

It seemed Nate's old theory about how much you could learn about a person from playing chess with them held true. He now knew Eliot was actually quite smart, already had a strong grasp of planning even if it took him a while to implement it in chess, and was quick to learn. Eliot had even let it slip that learn quickly was the only reason he'd survived this long.

Nate had learned something else, something that made his heart hurt just a little bit. An offhand compliment on picking up his lessons so fast had caused a wide grin to spread across the man's face. Suddenly he looked like an eager to please teenager and Nate had to wonder how long it had been since someone had just sat down and nicely taught him something.

After eating dinner Nate cleaned up the board, careful to put the pieces in easy reach for Eliot. Then he checked over Eliot's healing one last time before falling darkness made the retreat to his own mattress the best course of action.

Silence fell and lingered for awhile after that. It wasn't until guards tromped by the door unexpectedly and Nate found himself jerking to a sitting position, tense and waiting that Eliot spoke. "What's got you worked up?"

Nate looked into the inky darkness. "They don't normally come by this time of night."

"The patrols an hour late but there are plenty of reasons." Somehow Nate wasn't surprised that Eliot seemed to have the schedule of the guards committed to memory.

"It's what the reasons could be that have me worried." Nate admitted.

It was a moment before Eliot spoke, his voice a little gruff like he was uncomfortable. "You shouldn't need ta worry. They're not the one who did me over. Aren't paid enough to bother themselves."

Nate raised an eyebrow, which was mostly lost in the darkness, but his pointed silence got the message across.

"The job before this one went way farther south. Damn monkey got me landed in a Russian Crimelords dungeons. Took me awhile to get out. Then I got stupid and tried this job before I was back on my feet." He laughed bitterly at some irony Nate didn't catch. "Don't be afraid Nate." He said after a moment longer. "I don't think anyone's comin' for ya."

Nate sighed. It was a relief but also… well that was one way of putting the problem. "That's actually kind of what I'm afraid of." He mused out loud. "I figure they're holding me for ransom but… well I guess there's not a lot I can do but wait."

"And help out your cellmate." Eliot added, a note of irony. "I know no one's comin' for me. All I can hope for is once I get better I'll be able to get out of here on my own. I escaped that crime lord's dungeon. Took twenty tries but I did it in the end. They say it's just part of earnin' your stripes as a specialist. I'm just gettin' ahead of the game. Gonna be great one day. You might even chase me sometime."

Nate nodded uncomitably, though Eliot couldn't see it, and smiled up at the ceiling a little. There was still exhaustion in Eliot's voice and Nate knew enough about phycology that you didn't go from wanting to die to being well adjusted in three days but it was a start.

So he closed his eyes, bid Eliot good night, and tried to fall to sleep thinking about getting home and raising Sam and maybe how years from now Nate would be the one investigator of IYS who could catch Eliot, the best retrieval specialist in the world.


	3. Chapter 3

**Cell Number 8**

* * *

Eliot woke up before the sun. He lay there, staring at the darkness above thinking, feeling. He felt… better. He was healing quickly all things considered. His strength was coming back and the pain was fading away.

But it was more than that. He still felt tired, and Ammie was still in his mind like a dull ache ready to flare up at a moments thought. But at the same time it was easier, just a little easier.

He was waiting to get better but he was also anticipating sunrise in a way he couldn't really remember doing before. At sunrise Nate would wake up and check Eliot's injuries and they'd eat breakfast and then they'd play chess. Maybe Nate would even include one of those little lessons about different strategies or something and maybe Eliot would be able to surprise Nate with something. Yesterday Eliot had found out he liked suprising Nate. The older man would get quiet, a look on his face like he was considering a hundred different possibilities, and then after figuring out what everything meant he'd get that little smile of approval.

Eliot was honest with himself, if no one else. That smile made him feel good, warm inside. It dulled the ache a little.

And the Chess. Eliot knew Chess now, well, he knew how to play. Nate said no one could really **know** chess completely, which according to him was one of the great things about the game. But Nate said Eliot was picking it up quickly. It was strange but that made him feel good, like yesterday had meant something more than just another day of treading water to keep breathing.

He knew how to play chess and that was something he had that no one could take away from him. No matter what happened to him he could close his eyes and play chess in his head.

It was what he'd do until Nate woke up.

An hour later when Nate was checking his injuries and watching cautiously as Eliot sat up under his own power Eliot noticed the guards with breakfast was late. He hadn't been counting to keep time but when they did come Eliot guessed they were almost an hour late, if not longer. Their timing had been mostly precise since his arrival.

When they did come the guards seemed agitated, arguing and muttering without a glance towards the cell's occupants before continuing the argument as they left.

"This isn't good." Nate muttered looking over his options in the chess game they'd started before moving to get the food.

"What's not good?"

"The guards are upset and the higher ups are cutting their wages. Angry guards are never a good thing for us." Nate said with a long sigh.

"You speak Arabic?"

"A bit, you pick things up." Nate added offhand, handing Eliot his bowl.

Eliot took two long gulps of the mush, eating quickly it was the best way to get through the disgusting nature.

Arabic. While Eliot had been in Russia during the whole monkey fiasco he'd picked up Russian to get by. It had been useful and now, a month later he realized he still knew most of it, probably all if he practiced. It was another one of the things they couldn't take from him. It was something useful from the venture.

He hadn't even made the decision fully before he was putting down his bowl. "Teach me."

**oOo**

Two hours or more later when Eliot looked like he was developing a headache and was beginning to slur his words in even worse ways than he had been Nate called a halt to the impromptu lesson on basic Arabic. Nate had thought it odd that Eliot showed sudden interest in such a passing remark but he'd been almost eager, showing more life than Nate would of belived him capable of two days ago.

So Nate started trying to teach. His grasp of Arabic was basic, enough to get by and a little bit more maybe, and Nate wasn't sure how to teach languages to begin with, but it didn't seem to matter. Eliot had attacked the opportunity with a vengeance, not even frustrated by his own difficulty to twist his accent into unfamiliar sounds. He wouldn't be speaking fluently for a long time but Eliot had already picked up more basic phrases than most tourists ever would.

The smile on the young man's face was more reward for the effort than Nate would have thought.

He set up the chess board and declared they were taking a break.

After a game Nate decided to test a theory. As they started playing chess again Nate started to relate a story from one of the jobs he'd been on, the one with that dark haired woman he nearly caught a few months ago. It had art in it and he went off on a tangent about the art stolen, the fair and black market value for each piece, even the origins and artists and which artist's work was worth the most.

After rambling on through a few moves and more numbers than any normal person would remember off the top of his head he looked up, checking to see if Eliot was getting bored.

Eliot was watching him attentive, clearly paying careful attention to try to commit this all to memory.

Nate repeated one of the paintings he'd mentioned earlier with a different price and Eliot looked confused. "You said 132,000." Eliot interrupted.

"Just checking if you were paying attention." Nate said with a smile. "Good job."

Eliot shrugged, took Nate's bishop and brushed off the direct compliment, but his long hair didn't hide the pleased smile.

Before Nate even really made a conscious decision he found himself turning nearly everything they did into some lesson or another. What Nate had discovered the first time they played chess was proven again and again as one day passed into the next. Eliot was incredibly intelligent, picking up anything Nate threw at him with startling ease.

Nate managed to figure out Eliot hadn't even finished his freshman year of highschool before leaving home for "reasons" Eliot didn't clarify. It was a shame, Nate could almost imagine under different circumstance Eliot could of done anything he'd wanted to. As smart and able to think on his feet as Eliot was Nate had a mental image of him as some young partner at a big law firm or something, though he knew better than to share. Eliot seemed to share Nate's low opinion of most lawyers.

But even in these circumstances… it was impressive. It wasn't just that Eliot could pick up whatever Nate threw at him he **wanted** to. That first "teach me" turned out to be far from the last. If Nate said something or mentioned something and didn't explain it wouldn't be long before Eliot was asking.

Somewhere in the back of his head Nate acknowledged that he wasn't doing anyone any favors on explaining how a certain scam worked to a unrepentant thief or citing the places that sold the best knives in the world but at the same time he didn't care. In this cell honest man and thief had lost it's meaning. They were together in this, and every little lesson drew that tired young man he'd met the night he was thrown in here a step further back into the land of the living.

Four days after they'd met Eliot let Nate help him stand and make a loop around the cell before lying back down. It was Nate's turn to learn as Eliot taught him how to clear your head and measure the passing of time with nothing but your heartbeat.

It was how Eliot knew the schedule of the guards without a watch.

After they counted off an hour Nate helped Eliot back to his feet and they made another round. Nate was about to help him back down when Eliot shook his head and they made another loop. Eliot was panting and shaking by the time Nate helped him back down but he only grinned at Nate's concern. "I have ta push myself if I wanna get outta here."

Nate sighed cast about until he could think of something to lead into their latest topic while waiting for the next hour to wind away.

By the end of that day Eliot was moving by himself and by the end of the next Eliot declared himself on the mend enough Nate could stop hovering. He just had to get his feet under him now and it wouldn't be long before he made his escape.

Somehow neither of them had managed to talk much to each other after that.

The sixth day passed bordering on awkward as reality, and that Eliot was healed enough to start plotting his escape, hit them both hard. They played a couple games of chess but somehow the camaraderie of the past three days had faded.

**oOo**

Dinner never came that day.

Later Eliot would look back and remember that he'd learned from his time in Nishka's that once you learned the ways of your captors you learned to be wary of changed in behavior. A patrol being an hour late wasn't particularly upsetting.

But a meal never coming when they hadn't missed one in more than a week?

Eliot should have known nothing good would come of it.

If he hadn't been bogged down by the fact that he was well enough to leave now and he should be planning his escape and not wondering why the hell IYS hadn't come for Nate yet he just might of. As it was the whole peace of mind he seemed to have gained in the past week had disappeared the moment he realized this little cell wasn't going to last much longer.

He'd been taking a break from reality, learning and feeling and being treated like a human being for once and it was nice, but it wasn't real. It wouldn't last forever.

Exhaustion was already settling back around him.

A night of hunger, the reminder that their lives were up to the whims of their captors, reminded Eliot why he needed to get out of here. Captivity never ended well, no matter how much you liked spending time with your cellmate.

He did have one advantage though. Apparently the fact he'd been badly hurt and more or less suicidal when they'd taken him in meant they didn't consider him as much of a threat as Nishka had. He'd get one chance before that changed but chances were he wouldn't have too hard a time getting out of this mess now that he could walk more than a few feet.

Breakfast never came the seventh day, but it wasn't the lack of food that had them both concerned. There had been no water delivered to their cell since the morning before. It had been all gone since yesterday evening.

Eliot had lasted two day with a fever and no water but it had nearly killed him. By mid afternoon Eliot'd renewed health was already taking a sharp decline and they were both faced with a new terror. Neither of them knew why the deliveries had stopped.

And neither of them knew if they'd start again.

Or if it would be before one of them died.

**oOo**

By evening Nate was getting desperate. Without water neither of them would last much longer, Eliot had already reverted to laying on his pallet, staring at the ceiling, and trying to conserve energy. His health was failing quickly, and so close to his escape. Nate himself felt like his throat was made of sandpaper, thirst making his tongue stick to the roof of his mouth and the first signs of dehydration had set in awhile ago.

Despite his better judgment when Nate heard the tromp of boots of guards outside the cell Nate went to the barred window calling out in Arabic. "Please, sirs, we need water."

He didn't see their expression until it was too late.

"What the hell didja do that for?" Eliot asked, his throat scratchy, forcing himself into a sitting position. "Do you know wh-"

He was interrupted by keys turning in the lock and the cell door opening to reveal three guards. Nate didn't need to understand the words they were saying to realize his bad luck that had landed him here was back with a vengeance.

_"Angry guards are never a good thing" _His own words days ago sailed through his mind as two of the guards grabbed his arms and slammed him front forward into a wall while the other closed the door. His mind's processing rate seemed to slow down as some rough rope was tied around his wrists and jerked his arms over his head to catch over a hook in the wall near the ceiling.

There was movement behind him, a gasp and words of protest he should of understood but his mind went blank when a crack was followed by a white hot pain striking him from shoulder to hip.

A second blow caught him just as off guard, knocking what was left of his wind out of him and making him gasp.

Nate was an insurance investigator. He was a good guy, and honest guy. He'd been in fights before but this?

This was new. This he didn't know what to do about.

He'd lost his breath before the fourth blow, his mind fizzling out as being unable to breath added to pain and fear making any kind of lucid thought fly out the window.

Suddenly things stopped. The next blow didn't come. There was a scuffle and the sound of flesh hitting flesh and grunts for a few moments before he heard the telltale click of a safety being removed and Eliot growled. "I hate guns."

Suddenly someone was lifting him off the notch and tossed him haphazardly to the side, his head hitting the wall nearly hard enough to knock him out. Nate lay there dazed, slowly, pulling himself back together and ignoring the blood he could feel sluggishly dripping along his back and trying not to go under. He had to figure out what had happened.

He turned slowly, seeing guards tying a new rope around Eliot's wrists a gun still pressed to the back of his skull. Nate's head was still spinning but he was able to piece together enough of what they'd said to understand Eliot had tried to make his escape.

Nate was confused at the sheer stupidity for all of the minute it took to get Eliot into the position he'd been in moments ago before he felt the bottom of his stomache drop out.

Eliot closed his eyes, laid his cheek against the cold stone wall and waited, the light through the barred window of the cell door shinning across dozens of scars across his back.

Eliot had known he'd never get away.

He'd made a gambit to trade places with Nate.

As the guard raised his arm for the first blow Nate closed his eyes tight, trying to block out the sound of leather hitting flesh. All he could think was that he'd been wrong. Eliot may be a thief, he may have led a hard life.

But he was already a good man.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes: **A little shorter than my chapters normally run but after last chapter I got this sort of attatchment for cliffhangers.

* * *

**Cell Number Eight**

* * *

Pain.

It was one thing Eliot had always known. It had been a constant in his life since he'd been a child and his mother had remarried and life had gone to hell.

Pain.

Pain and protecting others from Pain.

It had started with his little sister. She was three years younger than him and only five years old when That Man married their mother. Eliot had spent his entire childhood with one simple goal in his mind, the only thing he really remembered of the absence that had been his father was the thing he'd tell El every time he visited. "You're her big brother El', your job is to protect her."

Pain

So Eliot had protected her. He'd protected her for seven years, through nineteen trips to the emergency room from "falling down the stairs" and seven more times Eliot probably should have gone but didn't. It wasn't until his baby sister was twelve and a pretty little thing and That Man was watching her in a way that made Eliot's blood boil that Eliot had taken action. Social services took his little sister away and no matter how much it hurt Eliot knew she was safest that way. He was protecting her, no matter how much it would and did cost him.

_Pain_.

It seeped into his reverie pulling him out of it and forcing him back against a cold stone wall. Pain and protecting those he cared about from pain. They were the most basic things Eliot knew. This? Acting and taking a beating for Nate? It had been instinctive, easy as breathing to act on. The fact that Nate now was under the category of people Eliot cared about was something Eliot would have to think about later.

Pain

It was getting harder now. Eliot focused on his breathing, the key was your breathing. Take in a deep breath and let it out slow as the blow strikes, let that be your release. Take another breath in before the next blow falls and continue. Never lose your breath. Remain detached.

_**Pain.**_

He felt light headed, his entire world narrowing down to his lungs burning from the effort to keep his breathing steady and the white hot fire that had taken residence on his back, growing with every strike.

PAIN

He'd lost his breathing pattern. He gasped for breath, sobbing despite himself, cursing his own body's ability to take so much without going under. If he lasted much longer they'd kill him. He…

PAIN

Just fucking stop

PAIN

Fuck

PAIN

"N..Naa

PAIN

PA-

**oOo**

Nate kept his eyes closed for a long time, the dreadful silence only broken by the crack of leather against skin, Eliot not letting a sound loose as he rode out the beating. It shamed Nate that he couldn't watch when Eliot had done this to protect him but he didn't think he could handle it. Eliot's silence frustrated the guards and as the sounds grew louder and Nate realized the grunts were coming from Eliot Nate forced his eyes to open.

If Nate ever forgot, ever found another sight that would blot out or overtake the nightmare of that sight… of seeing Eliot broken and bloody, Nate didn't think he'd ever find anything that could.

He prayed he never would.

Eliot cried out softly, a word escaping him that might have been "Nate" making Nate try desperately to get up.

Then suddenly it was over. Eliot slumped forward, passing out from pain and abuse.

The guards seemed satisfied, cutting down Eliot and letting him drop before cutting the rope from Nate's hands and leaving the cell, talking and laughing between themselves. Nate paid them no heed once they were gone, crossing over to Eliot in a second despite his pounding head and the wounds he bore on his own back.

Eliot was shivering, obviously going into shock from the trauma, back torn to shreds and bleeding freely. He'd have a new set of scars when this was all over if he survived.

With no water still it seemed unlikely.

Still, Nate wasn't going to give up on the boy.

Carefully Nate turned Eliot so he was lieing flat on his stomach and debated. He knew basic first aid but somehow that had never really covered what to do when a man's back was a mass of lacerations you couldn't even really see for all the blood. It wasn't like Nate could really do much anyway.

The blood was clotting at least. It looked like Eliot wouldn't bleed to death. Nate leaned his burning back against the cold stone wall and tried to pull himself together. Water! He felt wetness beneath his finger and soaking into his pants and Nate looked down realizing even as he raised his hand to his eyes that it wasn't water.

It was blood. His or Eliot's, or a mix, Nate wasn't sure.

Maybe he was in shock himself, or maybe it was the day without water, or maybe the head injury was worse than he thought because he couldn't really remember much after that for a little while. Then the cell door opened and a different guard came in with two buckets of water, leaving them by the door before dropping a rag into one and leaving.

As soon as the door was closed Nate all but attack the buckets, drinking greedily from one before coming back to his senses and realizing they had to make this last.

He couldn't feel regret though. This meant maybe he could pull his young companion through this and repay the loyalty.

Taking the rag, and pouring most of the contents of one bucket into the other so not to taint too much of their water Nate prepared for the task ahead.

Trying to keep his hands from shaking he got to work cleaning Eliot up.

The water in the bucket was red in minutes and Eliot hissed in pain even unconscious. Nate did his best to be gentle, keeping a soft running stream of soothing words, finding his free hand running through Eliot's hair from time to time to try to ease him further as he tried to coax Eliot away from death's door for the second time in a week.

It was an hour or two later, Nate was too exhausted to do the counting thing Eliot had taught him, but after Nate had finished all he could and was left to the waiting game of hoping Eliot would pull through, when Eliot finally stirred.

He didn't speak, or for that matter even fully wake up, more let out a low groan and shifted a little, not even opening his eyes. Nate reached over, putting his hand on Eliot's head to tell him to lie still only to find despite his best efforts a fever was setting in.

Eliot shifted again, gasping something softly, his eyes dancing beneath their lids. With fever was coming nightmares.

This would be a long night still.

**oOo**

_It was late. That Man should be home already. Being this late meant he was drinking. _

_El hurried from one side of the house to the other, checking things as he went to try to make sure everything was perfect. It didn't matter, That Man always found something to complain about especially when he'd been drinking, but sometimes when it was only in his head all That Man did was yell._

_He found Joey sitting halfway up the stairs, her blue eyes watching him carefully. She knew what That Man being home late meant. Even their mother knew it was never a good thing when That Man came home late, though she turned a blind eye to the terror it was for the two of them._

_"Go on up ta bed Joey." Eliot told his little sister, not caring that it was eight o'clock at night and she was a "big girl" at all of eight years old. "I'll be up in a little while ta read you your bedtime story."_

_He heard the truck door slam in the driveway outside._

_"Ellie, come up with me." She pleaded like she did every time he sent her to bed early. She was little but bright, she'd made the connection between early bed times and Eliot's bruises more than a year ago. "We'll hide, just 'til he's not so mad."_

_"You go upstairs now Josephine." Eliot ordered, getting his big brother voice on, trying to cover the note of hysteria. He had only a couple of minutes before That Man came walking in yelling for him._

_"Ellie!"_

_"Now Joey." She hugged him gently. It hurt a little that she always had to be so gentle with him but they both knew most days he was barely walking. He patted her back, returning the embrace with a tight big brother bear hug. "Go on up. I'll be with ya once I've done my job."_

_He let her go and turned away suddenly finding himself being restrained by two guards watching as Joey got hung up by her wrists and beaten for asking for water. It boiled his blood and he lashed out, watching Joey transform into Nate but the instinct to protect stayed the same. Joey was his sister but Nate was his teacher and maybe maybe beginning to obtain that attachment Eliot had never really given to a father_.

_Eliot fought the gaurds restraining him, almost roaring in anger as the beating continued ruthlessly. He shouted for them to stop before they killed him. Nate wasn't used to brutality, the unmarred back made it clear. Each new welt and cut stung something in Eliot's mind like he was watching something innocent marred. _

_Hands were shaking him now, gently, and Eliot looked up to see Joey. _

_They were back at That Place, back home with That Man and Joey looked like a child again, all pig-tails, and smiles, and faked innocence better than any griffter could hope to match. She was shaking him, telling him something but he couldn't make out what she was saying._

_She was desperate though, but gentle. _

_Always so gentle._

_Eliot's eyes widened when he saw what had scared his baby sister so. It was That Man, slowly oozing from room to room toward them, his wide leather belt hanging from his hand. _

_"Hey there pretty girl." That Man almost crooned mockingly, coming to stand behind Joey like a dark shadow. "Why don't you run along and play so your brother and I can talk."_

_Eliot tried to move, but he felt like his limbs were made of white hot lead. He'd be back to the hospital after this for sure._

_But he had to move. Joey was in danger and he was a big brother and he would die before he let That Bad Man lay a single finger on his sister. His blood was boiling, heart pounding in his ears, breath a strangle pant. He'd taken this so long and not done anything. He let That Man have him so he'd stay away from his sister._

_Something inside of him reasoned if That Man was going to hurt his sister there was no reason to hold back._

_Joey turned to look up at That Man, refusing to move away from her post over her brother's prone form. _

_That Man raised his arm to strike and something inside Eliot just snapped. _

_Anger, hate, fear, hurt, betrayal, rage, and love boiled to a frenzy in a fraction of a second and everything whited out into a haze. A soft, comforting, haze without thought, without feeling, without pain as his conscious mind took a little holiday._

_Suddenly he was ripped from that beautiful white haze and dropped back into agonizing reality to find his hands wrapped around a little throat as Joey cried and choked begging him to stop._

**oOo**

Nate gasped for breath, struggling for air as he tried to dislodge the steel strong hands wrapped around his throat, pinning him against the wall.

"Eliot" He choked. "El."

But he might as well been talking to a wall.

There was no recognition in those blue eyes.


	5. Chapter 5

**Cell Number 8**

* * *

_Joey's eyes were wide, blinking up at him. "El"_

_Horrified Eliot dropped his hands staggering backwards. How? What?_

_Agony broke across his consciousness, pounding through him and making him collapse and curl forward. Arms caught him, pulling him close and safe in a way that couldn't be a dream._

_No one had ever really held him like this._

Someone ran a hand through his hair, muttering soft words in his ear. "Don't understand." Eliot whispered without really meaning to. He didn't. It was all… too much, too strange. He was angry and scared and it fucking hurt so much just to breath and it just… he couldn't understand anything.

_Except that he felt safe._

_And the feeling was so strange he was terrified it was just a fleeting part of this half waking dream he was in._

_He tried to breath steadily, feeling like the would was flying out of control but there was something, a soft steady thumping rhythm right against his right ear. Steady and strong and relaxing. The hand in his hair rested on the back on his neck._

_It felt real. It felt solid._

_Like when he emptied his mind to try to measure the passage of time Eliot just breathed, letting everything go. He was feeling so much, drowning in everything and his mind couldn't even process what anything meant or came from. He had to be able to thing or not think at all. _

_So he let it all go. Let it all fade away into blissful white of oblivion and fade away from the fire rising in his skin._

_**oOo**_

When Eliot surfaced he knew he was awake, though he drifted just barely to the lucid side of awareness where he was awake but not quite moving yet.

He was leaning forward at an odd angle, his chest leaning against another body with the right side of his head resting against a bare shoulder and chest. Arms were holding him carefully, mindful of the agony that was his back Eliot knew came from a rather nasty beating.

Nate.

Nate was holding him, almost like you'd hold a child.

Holding him tight, close.

Safe.

A soft voice reached him ears. Nate was whispering, his voice soft and soothing as it flowed easily from word to word that blended together before Eliot could really tell exactly what Nate was saying. It sounded like a prayer almost.

Maybe Nate was praying for him?

Eliot stirred a little and the words stopped, the hand lifting from his neck. "Eliot?" Nate asked slowly.

Eliot tried to answer but he couldn't quite make his voice work. Something between a murmmer and moan passing his lips.

Slowly Nate maneuvered him a little. "Sorry." Nate whispered a second before shifting so he was holding Eliot up by an arm across his back, tearing another moan from him. "Water" Nate said before touching the rim of a metal pail to Eliot's lips and helping him drink something.

A few minutes later, leaning back against Nate's chest, slipping off into Oblivion once more Eliot wasn't sure if he was slipping back to sleep or waking up from a dream anymore.

**oOo**

Nate had watched in strange horror and awe as that murderous look in Eliot's eyes dissolved and his body had spasamed as adrenalin gave way to the agony that movement must have been for him. He'd moved without thinking, steadying him and pulling him close to rest against his chest, Nate's own injured back resting against the rough stone wall somehow didn't burn as badly as it should.

Eliot's breath was quick and pained, so close to sobbing Nate was surprised the man wasn't crying. Nate didn't really understand what had just happened, and there was a lot about Eliot he wasn't sure he'd ever understand but at that moment Nate had been going on instinct. Nightmares were nightmares, whether you were an eight year old boy dreaming about monsters in the closet or a twenty something man who'd been put through hell too many times, someone holding you made things a little better.

So close Nate could feel the heat of a fever setting back into Eliot and closed his eyes. If it was because of an infection it could mean Eliot would die. Hell, Nate already wasn't sure if Eliot would live through the night.

Without even realizing it the soothing murmur of words Nate had been whispering turned into a soft prayer.

Somehow he couldn't bare the idea of Eliot dieing.

And so he'd prayed and Eliot's sobs had died down and he'd slept for a time to wake again. Nate helped him drink and watched as once again Eliot faded away.

It was strange, how a week ago they had been strangers. A week ago if someone had told Nate he would care this much about a thief, that he'd see one almost… almost like a son… he would have laughed. He'd always thought thieves were greedy and selfish, doing whatever they had to get what they wanted even if it hurt someone. He'd thought they only cared about themselves.

But a thief had just taken a brutal beating to protect him. Nate traced the tip of a finger over a scar that marked the back of Eliot's neck.

Now Nate was beginning to wonder how many thieves had been made what they were, at least partly. How many thieves had simply been forced to live in a cruel world and learned how to survive as best they could? If whoever had hurt Eliot as a child had been a good parent would he have turned out differently?

Nate looked down at the man in his arms, lines of pain smoothed away in sleep and those paranoid eyes closed to the world making him look his age for once.

A week ago he would never have believed he'd look at a thief like Eliot and feel like he was holding a son.

And soon they'd part ways to never see each other again.

A bittersweet smile crossed Nate's lips and he sighed, leaning his head back. "Protect this man" He whispered. "Protect my sons."

**oOo**

_Pain!_

_Eliot screamed, thrashing against the bindings that held him as sparking alligator clips touched his chest again making his mind blank in pain for a second as his body reacted to the shock. They moved away and he relaxed again._

_Nishka's face swam above him. Taunting and questioning and god Eliot prayed one day he'd be able to punch that little ratty face so bad even the people who look like him would be in pieces. Guards hauled him to his feet, holding him tight._

_The Nishka became That Man and Joey was there and Eliot thrashed out. Somewhere in his mind he knew that the hell that had been Nishka's prisons had never touched Joey. Joey had been safe and free by then. Everything was okay. _

_The crack of a whip and his mind shifted. _

_He was free but staring at a burning barn holding a ring in his hand and nothing made sense._

His eyes opened to find daybreak had come. Nate was still holding him but his mind was a little clearer than it had been. He lay still for a long moment, trying to pull himself back together and determine if Nate was awake or asleep.

The steady rising and falling of Nate's chest told him he was still asleep. Slowly, more because it was really the only option when he was this badly hurt than in difference to Nate, Eliot pulled away from the older man. He felt lightheaded but felt strong enough to move. The beating was bad but he'd grown up on a steady diet of brutality. He could deal.

Sometime during the night or in the morning the normal trays had been delivered to the cell so Eliot went to his own, drinking and taking care of necessities while Nate was out. He was bringing Nate's food and water to him when Nate stirred, opening his eyes and looking around until he saw Eliot. "Should you be walking around?" He asked, sounding concerned.

Eliot shrugged just enough to avoid hurting his back further. "I'm used to it. When I was a kid my step dad'd beat the shit outta me." Eliot wasn't sure why he elaborated. For all that week Nate had really been the only one to talk about personal matters. He felt like something had changed overnight, just wasn't sure how much.

"Oh…sorry." Nate said, like most people not really knowing how to respond.

"He's doing twenty five years of hard time." Eliot said with another shrug. "Breakfast came." He said handing Nate his food. "When you're finished eating I'm gonna take a look at your injuries. Don't want you dieing on me."

They ate in silence for awhile after that, both lost in their thoughts. It was only after Eliot was sitting behind Nate, picking the gravel and dirt out of the cuts on his back and mumbling about Nate not taking care of himself that either really said anything.

"It's none of my business but what were you dreaming about?" Nate asked and Eliot paused for a moment, wondering how or if he even should answer that.

That something in him didn't mind the personal question and wanted to answer because it was Nate should have been more surprising.

Finally he sighed. "I was dreaming about Nishka's dungeons. It hasn't been that long since I escaped. I guess…"

"This brought back bad memories?" Nate filled.

"Yeah."

"If you were still as hurt from that as you were why did you do this job? You should know better."

Eliot let out a long breath, that pain flaring up again as he thought about Ammie. He curled his hand closed, feeling the ghost of the promise ring he'd given her in the palm of his hand. "I don't know. I was a mess."

"I could tell." Nate commented. "First time I saw you you looked like you were waiting for death to get the memo." It was a statement but the question was obvious.

Eliot closed opened his mouth and closed it, his chest tightening as he tried to put into words what he'd been carrying around all this time. "Theres this girl… knew her since I was a kid. Use'd ta patch me up sometimes. She was the one who got me ta run when I did. She and her dad were family and no matter how long I was gone I could come home ta her. For years they've been all I've had." His voice faded away for a second. "We were talking about getting engaged but I went off on this job and got caught by Nishka. I spent three months in his dungeons. Only reason I escaped before I died was cause I kept tellin' myself I was gonna get out and marry her."

He shook his head, bitter laugh escaping his lips. "I finally get back to see her and she's engaged to someone else. She told me not to come back. I don't know if I was running or trying to get myself killed but I didn't have anything left but the job after that. So I did a job."

Nate was quiet. Which wasn't surprising considering what he'd just been told.

"So yeah. I was already messed up then put back into a place, which didn't exactly bring back good memories. I'd had enough."

Nate was still quiet.

So Eliot went back to his work.

Sometime later Nate finally spoke. "When you get out of here what are you going to do?" The real question was obvious.

"I don't know. A week ago I'd probably say pick a fight with someone who'd kill me but now… I don't know." He grinned a little. "Probably another job, it's what I do and I need money."

"If you didn't need money what would you do?"

That earned a laugh from Eliot before he realized it was a serious question. "Normally horses... but I… her daddy owned a stable so I don't think." He sighed. "Honestly I don't know. My whole life's been what I had ta do, not what I wanted." He sighed. "If I could… I'd do somthin' to leave a mark. Somthin' to let the world know I was here for once. Those in my line live and fight and die without leaving anything more than a trail of bodies behind. I don't want ta be that."

Nate nodded but didn't respond.

Eliot finished soon after that and they both moved, setting out the chess board without even needing to speak. They were four moves in when Nate spoke.

"I don't think IYS is coming for me. I know you're leaving as soon as you can escape but you think you can give your old teacher a couple lessons before you go?"

"Lessons, maybe" Eliot said slowly as he moved. "But I think I can do better." He'd never done it before but he'd been making plans for days.

"Huh?"

Eliot looked up, meeting Nate's eyes. "I'll getcha outta here myself."


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes: **This chapter really really wanted to be a training montage. I still think it's feelings are a little hurt about the fact it couldn't be. Also the formatting hates me as usual. I've decided not to be OCD about it anymore. Sorry sportsfans.

* * *

**Cell Number Eight**

* * *

Eliot said he'd bust them both out, but it didn't take Nate long to realize things wouldn't be as easy as Eliot had made it sound. For one, as much as Eliot was moving around and acting for all the world like Nate was the one who'd taken the worst of the beatings, Nate knew he was just good at coping. Every so often Eliot would move too fast or turn a little to much and pain would flare across his face before he breathed through it and went on like nothing had happened. It hurt a little to watch.

Secondly Nate quickly realized when Eliot had mentioned lessons he'd meant it.

The words were barely out of Eliot's mouth before he was putting away the chess board and sorting through the larger of the stones they used for pieces. Before Nate could ask him what he was doing Eliot scratched one along the stone of the floor producing a nail's on chalkboard sound. He put it back in the pile, testing two more before one produced a light gray line on the darker gray stone. "Perfect."

Eliot scooted back into his corner, resting his back against the cool stone wall while moving the stone to write on the wall to his right. After testing the stone again, licking his thumb and smudging out the line he nodded. "Like lists." He said, writing a one on the wall. "lists and numbers, habits and protocols. They can getcha killed if you rely too much on 'em but they'll keep you alive if you use 'em right."

Nate nodded, despite being a little surprised to hear this coming from a thief. "So what's the first list?"

Eliot was stretching out, listing twenty-tree numbers on the wall. "I escaped Nishka's prisons not a month ago Nate. It took me twenty two tries before I got out on the twenty-third. Every time I failed I made sure I learned somthin' from it." He started adding to the number one. "'m not a teacher like you Nate but I figure if you know 'em then that's twenty three beatings you won't be takin' somewhere down the line."

Nate nodded, wincing at the idea but paying attention to Eliot as he wrote on the wall.

"You already saw what happens when you try to escape in front of a guard. Bad idea no matter how good ya are in a fight. Guards have guns. You don't. It's not a rule 'cause I already knew it but you don't mess with guns. Not with people who have 'em, not when you have one. It's askin' for trouble."

Nate winced, he'd never been shot but he'd always been uncomfortable with the idea he might someday. "You really don't like guns do you?"

"Get shot a couple of times and you won't like 'em either." He said with a grim smile. "The next couple are about picking locks.

_1. Avoid direct confrontations with guards.._

Nate grinned a little at rule number two. "Necessity is the mother of invention?"

"Desperation more like." Eliot said, letting out a long breath, his mind slipping back weeks.

_That afternoon Nishka had been excited about a new torture device. He had Eliot on the rack and was driving the little silver and wooden spines into his skin. It wasn't bad, as Nishka's torment usually went. They were only five inches long and thiner than a pencil and only stuck in just enough to hold. It wasn't until Nishka brought over a candle and started lighting the ends, the poison on the tips reacting to the heat to send burning pain flowing through his veins. _

_Eliot lost track of time, tune out and signed off for awhile. He almost missed when one of the assistants knocked over a tray of the little spines._

_When they were finished with him, releasing the straps holding him, Eliot dropped to the floor trying to pull himself back together. He had only a few moments but it was enough to act. A few spines were still scattered onto the floor. For a modern lock they wouldn't work but the clunky old fashioned shackles Nishka was using? It might just work._

_He'd spent four days trying to figure out some way to get the cuffs off and now Nishka gave it to him. Irony._

_He'd never forget though._

Eliot shook off the reverie, nodding to Nate. "Though you should also pay the third rule mind."

"Okay, What's next?"

Eliot rolled his shoulders and winced. "Reconosance, but first I need ta be a little more mobile and it needs to be a little later." He put down his chalk and started setting the chess board back up.

_2. A lot of things can be used to pick locks.  
__3. Picking a lock fast is not a substitute for picking it quietly.._

"Wait what?" Nate asked after their meal was delivered. "You're not serious."

"I'm going out there." Eliot said again. "To take a look around, get a lay of the land. The guards are gone, they won't be back for a couple of hours."

"Wh…how?"

"Theres nothng worse than running blind. The guards know this place, we don't. They already have too many advantages."

"You're going to get caught."

"Sneak" Eliot said holding up one finger before adding a second. "Don't stop moving. I only ever got caught for being careless twice. I know how to get out and back safely. I'll be back before you know it. Scouts honor." He gave something marginally close to a salute.

"wrong hand." Nate said tiredly. "How will you get out?"

"I snatched a key off a guard when we were tusslin' yesterday.

"You have a key?"

Eliot sighed and wrote next to number seven. "I'll be back in a bit."

_4. Learn the guards shifts and the layout.  
__5. Sneak  
__6. Don't stop moving.  
__7. A key does not solve everything._

Eliot crept out the cell and down the hall. He'd time it so he was making this little expadition at night, after sunset but before it got late when most of the guards would have plenty of reasons to be elsewhere.

He ghosted down the hall, a shadow on dirty stone walls. A year ago he probably would have laughed if you told him the childhood of sneaking around to avoid That Man's attention would develop into this.

He kept his right side against the right wall, using it to keep from getting lost in the dim passageways. All he would have to do to find his way back to the cell was turn around and keep his left side to the same wall until he reached the little cell marked "8". It was something he'd read in a book to Joey when they were younger, called walking Widershins or something like that.

He ignored the bittersweet train of thought and focused on his surroundings.

He'd managed to get a feeling of what seemed to be most of the dungeons when something seemed to change. He couldn't put his finger on it but calm collected searching was beginning to turn a tad paranoid without obvious cause. It was… well he reminded himself of rule ten. Just because he didn't see guards didn't mean they didn't see him. Even if they couldn't see him he had a feeling things were about to go badly.

He didn't wait or question that. He turned around, calculated where he was in the map he'd been building in his head, set a route and returned to the cell as quickly as he could.

He would never find out if there had been anything out there to run from but he'd later tell Nate there was a reason rule eleven was trusting your gut.

_8. Walk widershins.  
__9. Don't entertain revenge. Getting out is the priority.  
__10. Just because you don't see them doesn't mean they don't see you.  
__11. Trust your gutt instincts._

_Eliot ghosted down the hallway, exploring farther afield, getting a better idea of what was really going on. _

_What was really going on? Something wasn't right._

_Why was he in Nishka's dungeons all of a sudden?_

_Voices up ahead. Eliot pressed himself into a shallow cranny. He had nowhere to hide and they were coming toward him. He breathed a sigh of relief when he saw it was Fat Red and the Guy with serious BO. They were a pair of guards who'd argue so much it was a wonder Nishka didn't have them killed for being sloppy. They wouldn't of noticed him if he was standing in the middle of the hallway._

_But just as they were passing his hiding place something happened. Eliot's mind was fuzzy about what, skipping over it and to the surprised face before they raised the alarm. _

_Suddenly guards were everywhere and Nishka was irate rather than disturbingly cheerful and he'd being dragged back to that room. Pull and stretched out onto the table, tied down so tight he couldn't even move Eliot closed his eyes and prepared himself. _

_What had he done? Just bad luck? _

_Why was it always bad luck._

_Why was he back here?_

_Sparking alligator clips touched his chest and conscious thought flew out the window._

He jolted awake to find Nate shaking his shoulder. "You okay?" He asked.

Eliot nodded, shrugging away that look Nate was giving him. He was fine. Why did Nate look so worried? He didn't need to be. "I just got unlucky. It happens sometimes."

_12. Annoyed guards are sloppy. Frightened guards are paranoid.  
__13. Sometimes you're just unlucky._

"It's almost time for dinner." Eliot said near the end of the next day. They'd spent most of it swapping lessons and stories. Neither spoke it out loud but they shared an understanding that Eliot needed to be in better health before they made an escape attempt. He could ghost down the hallways of the dungeon but the first attempt would be their best shot and he needed more than a couple of days to recover before he could make the best of it.

They weren't wasted days though. Eliot was giving Nate a crash course in more than just basic rules of escape and promised lessons in combat in a couple of days.

"What?" Nate asked, seemingly taken by surprise by the sudden change in topic.

"The guards should be comin' soon." Eliot said again beckoning Nate over to the cell door. "I got out of Nishka's partially thanks to something I heard the guards talking about. They were slipping out ta go into town."

"You want me to listen to what they're saying?"

Eliot nodded and they sat together by the door. "You escape out of back doors an'guards always know where they are. If ya can't hear them talk about one find a kitchen. Food means trash and some way ta get rid of it."

"I hear them coming" Nate said and they both fell silent.

_14. Security measures change  
__15. Find a back door.  
__16. Listen  
__17. Smell_

Careful, careful, _Eliot told himself as he creaked open a door to the stairwell. He'd gotten the keycode and gotten past a couple of guards and he could almost taste the sun. _

Bllreee blreee blreee

_The alarm screeched in his ears, reaching higher and higher into a fever pitch. His heart pounded louder in his chest. They knew he'd escaped._

_Guards came at him out of nowhere, leaving him no room to run and nowhere to hide. He fought back, hard. The first few who came at him didn't stand a chance but they got organized. _

_A stun gun's taser hit him in the back, taking him down but the guards closed in. He was humiliating them, infuriating them by edging closer and closer to escape even as they recaptured him._

_A booted foot found his stomach, and another. _

_Fists and boots and whips decended, taunting him to get up and run even as his body was still trying to recover from the electro shock._

_Blows rolled together until he could do little more than scream._

_18. Alarms mean the game is up but you don't have to go quietly._

Nate lay awake late the third night after Eliot was beaten, waiting. He didn't admit what he was waiting for. Though the fact that Eliot had gone from sleeping soundly to barely being able to get a few hours of rest without nightmares may have had something to do with it.

So he was waiting, staring into the darkness of the cell and thinking about the latest four rules Eliot had shared. Guards carrying useful things to steal was relatively obvious though it might have no immediately occurred to him. Given adrenalin maybe it wouldn't ever had. Disguises weren't a question for a conman and he knew from first hand experience that crazy schemes works with unlikely regularity.

Though Eliot's story of how he broke out by walking through the guards barracks in the middle of the day was more than a little impressive.

Rule twenty-one?

It was the only rule he hadn't really elaborated on more than to say it was a reminder, that he'd learned it and relearned it. He admitted it was a little to pad the numbers out in his head.

Though Nate wondered just a little if there was a story behind it.

He closed his eyes and tried to relax. Eliot said that tomorrow they'd start making final plans for getting out of here. By Nate's count he'd been in here for ten days.

He was ready to get home.

There was movement on the far side of the cell. Eliot was having another nightmare.

Before they got out of here Nate needed to get Elliot to talk. He had a feeling Elliot hadn't dealt with what had happened to him at Nishka's hands so much as buried it. The beating he'd taken seemed to have brought it back up and Nate didn't want Eliot to leave here as shaken as he'd been when he arrived.

"Eliot…" Nate said softly, crossing over to the younger man.

_19. Guards carry useful things  
__20. A disguise only works if you act the part.  
__21. Do what you have to to survive.  
__22. Sometimes it is crazy enough to work_

_Something shifted, something changed. Someone was there._

_Hands undid the cuffs holding him to the table. A bright light washed clean the room and when he opened his eyes and saw again he was standing outside the compound. He looked up, saw blue skies, felt the sun on his face for the first time in three months._

_And he remembered that little peace little moments. Like when he was small and he'd run just to feel the wind in his hair and the sun on his face and feel alive._

_He felt alive again._

_A hand slipped into his own and he heard two voices say together what he'd told himself not to many weeks ago. "Feel the sun on your face but keep moving…"_

After a moment Eliot stilled beneath Nate's hand. He muttered something and Nate leaned close to try to catch what was being said.

"…Keep moving. Nate's not home yet."

_23. Feel the sun on your skin, but keep moving. You're not home yet._


	7. Chapter 7

**Notes: **There will likely be one more chapter and then an epilouge. I just would like to send a shout out of thank you to everyone who reviewed. This chapter was difficult to write since it contains a lot of elements I'm not very good at (Action sequences, actual pulling off of escapes and such, ect.). Your encouragment helped me force myself to work through it. *Bows* thank you.

* * *

**Cell Number Eight  
**

* * *

With the final lesson the rules of the game changed quickly. What before had been a crash course for Nate in the rules of escape and survival became a observationary course in cutting corners to recovery.

Four days after the incident with the guards Nate woke to find the space beside him empty.

A lot of other rules had been changing in the past few days but sleeping arrangements seemed most distinct. Where before they'd doused the light (when the guards provided one) and retreated to separate pallets on far sides of the narrow cell. But in the days after the guard's intrusion into their little world Eliot's sleep had been disturbed by nightmares more and more, the beating reopening more than just physical wounds.

After the first night Nate had retreated to his own pallet and Eliot to his, resuming their traditional patterns but Eliot's restless slumber through that night had kept Nate awake and the following night, unable to stand it longer, Nate had crossed the dark cell for the first time and drove off the nightmares, standing guard (or sleeping guard) over the younger man. When Nate remembered following Eliot into a finally restful sleep they'd been lying shoulder to shoulder.

Somehow it seemed significant to Nate. After everything that had happened the last few barriers between them had finally been stripped away.

Or so he'd thought. Only half awake Nate had to wonder if maybe Eliot had read more into it than he'd thought. He hoped not. The idea of… well that was awkward at best.

He rolled over, trying to wake up, wincing as the movement pulled at the still healing wounds on his back. The sight he found made him take a sharp breath, worry for a moment, but smile none the less.

Eliot stood near the far wall of the room, eyes closed, statue still, just breathing slowly in and out. Without opening his eyes he moved, slow, deliberate. It took Nate a moment to identify the action, Katas, martial arts practice routines done to practice, master moves, and build endurance.

He moved slowly through one, block, hit, duck, block, dodge, blow. Nate didn't know much about what he was seeing but it looked impressive.

It looked damn impressive.

He returned to the beginning and began again, moving a little faster.

It wasn't until Nate sat up, still feeling the effects of a much lighter beating that he had to wonder at Eliot. Three days ago he'd been beaten unconscious and now he was moving with more ease and precision than Nate knew how on a good day.

Eliot finished the repetition he was going through and turned to Nate, opening his eyes and breathing a little hard but still smiling. "Mornin', did I wake ya?"

Nate shook his head. "Don't let me stop you." He said gesturing.

Eliot shrugged and sat down, still grinning. It seemed the exercise had put him in a good mood despite the previous night's terrors. "I need to take a break anyway. I'm pushing myself hard to get back to fightin' form but it won't do us any good if I push too hard an' hurt myself." He sat beside Nate, stretching. After a moment he stopped. "Whatcha lookin' at?"

Nate mentally shook himself and stopped staring, turning to the door, listening for the sound of "room service" coming down the hall. "Guess I just never really thought about Hitters practicing martial arts. Not a lot of Hitters I've seen actually do much hitting. Guns took the necessity out."

"Don't like guns" Eliot said with a bitter grin. "And any Hitter that wants to survive his first job practices any time they get the chance." He settled down a little, apparently trying to relax to let his body recover before he forced it back into motion. "And not just one thing. I don't like guns but I used to practice at a range once a week to make sure I know how to use one." He grinned, something amusing him. "Ya know they say Hitters are thieves too dumb for a proper con. Any of us could tell ya that it's only the smart ones survive long in the buiz."

"I wouldn't agree with you." Nate said offhand reaching out to nudge Eliot's shoulder that was closest to him. Understanding his intentions without further prompting, he turned his back to Nate to give him a better view of his injuries. Nate continued talking as he checked for signs of infection and examined the places where the activity had reopened the wounds. He'd learned the earlier day to let them go without comment, Eliot's only reaction to his concern had been a shrug. "Hitters I've been sent after have a tendency to be annoyingly lucky."

Eliot turned his head, giving Nate a look.

"Current situation aside." Nate added, mostly to appease his patient to keep him from twisting further and undoubtedly hurting himself. Nate didn't mention the bizzar twist of fate that had landed them in the same cell was probably the only reason Eliot hadn't died more than a week ago.

Eliot faced forward once more without comment but a few minutes later, when Eliot stood up to force himself through more training he half muttered, half growled something that sounded suspiciously like a thank you.

Judging by the way he wouldn't look at Nate and his face was more flushed than it should have been when he'd only just started moving Nate had a feeling Eliot was talking about more than just the medical help.

That night Eliot said they should save the stump of the candle they had left. He didn't think they'd need it for the escape but you never knew.

So when the sun went down and the cell fell into nighttime darkness they settled onto their pallets one more time. "Tomorrow night." Eliot said after they'd settled down.

"Tomorrow night?"

"I'm not gonna get much stronger and I've done as much preparation as I can. Tomorrow night we break out of here. I think I can get us to the garage. We need a ride or we'll be stuck in the desert without water come mornin'." This was Egypt in the dry season, Nate knew if that happened they'd be lucky to live to see nightfall.

"Tomorrow night." Nate confirmed.

Silence returned briefly, Nate practiced the counting/timing method Eliot had taught him for lack of something better to do. He'd made it to just past four hundred when Eliot shifted on his pallet and sighed. "You know it's still light enough that if you came over now instead of waitin' for later you'd probably manage to not trip and kill me."

Nate rolled over and pushed himself up, crossing to lie next to Eliot. As he dropped to one knee beside him, trying to leverage himself down without aggravating his injuries he stopped. A fleeting look of something across Eliot's face, the way the man almost shifted away but didn't, it gave Nate pause.

But it was probably the darkness and his own growing paranoia at the back of his mind about this weird friendship with Eliot mixed with the boy's none too pleasant history. He lay down and Eliot relaxed.

They didn't say anything, not even good night, just closed their eyes and let healing sleep steal over them.

**oOo**

The day dragged on long.

Plans were formed and prepared by noon leaving them hours to kill before they could make their escape.

They played one last chess game. Traded little bits of languages. Nate watched Eliot do his exercises, still unable to get over them. Something just caught and held his attention.

Eliot must have caught him watching a few too many times because as the day was beginning to dim just a hint Eliot stopped his exercise and turned, gripping Nate's arm and pulling him to his feet. "You need to get some exercise."

And so cell number eight saw one last lesson. With steady hands Eliot guided him through a very basic kata.

Darkness found them laying down to rest for the long night ahead, the kata having done the most to sooth their nerves that could be hoped for.

Neither slept, only one prayed, and both of them briefly entertained the idea of delaying one more day.

"Nate?"

"Yeah?"

"I… uh" There was a long moment where things were almost said but left as offerings to the darkness around them. Eliot sighed then sat up. "Lets go."

"I'll follow you."

**oOo**

Eliot stood beside the door, eyes closed, listening. They normally heard the guards coming far in advance but there was no reason to be careless.

He took the moment to take a breath and center himself. Somewhere along the line Nate had sparked his old fire in him. That desperation, that Thing, that violence inside his mind was awake again and looking for a fight. He'd felt it during the beating but now as danger pressed near…

But Nate was with him. There could be no mistakes.

His entire world was focused on getting Nate out and to safety now and the idea of losing control of That Thing, of hurting Nate… It made him feel sick.

He nodded to Nate, unlocked the door, and they crept out into the hallway together.

It had always been a strangely surreal experience, creeping through darkened hallways, listening for just the softest hint of a noise that would clue you in to an approaching enemy, moving towards a destination as seconds ticked by like hours.

Eliot kept his mental map of his surroundings in his mind, taking them down barely used hallways and up a flight of stairs. Twice he pulled them into an abandoned room or down a side hallway and pressed them back against a wall, barely breathing as they listened to voices and footsteps creep by.

It was almost too easy, which was making Eliot more than a little paranoid. He knew there was no reason for the guards to not come after them immediately should they find out that he and Nate had escaped but it was too easy. He wasn't used to being lucky. He was used to fate screwing him six different ways before breakfast.

They reached the garage without incident, Eliot picking the lock and pulling them inside, closing the door behind them.

It was dark, just a few emergency lights on. A small fleet of cars and jeeps sat and a closed metal door sat between them and the outside of the compound.

Almost too easy.

Eliot turned to Nate, asking just barely above a whisper, a question that hadn't occurred to him until now. "Can you hotwire a car?" Nate's expression reminded Eliot about the difference between their worlds. It hadn't occurred to Eliot that Nate might not know. "Try to figure out how to open the bay doors."

Nate nodded and turned toward the doors when Eliot's usual luck got the memo that it was needed.

**oOo**

Nate heard the door to the garage open only a moment before Eliot tackled him to the ground, gunfire hitting the wall where he'd been standing moments before.

Time started to move to quickly as Eliot dragged him, stumbling to his feet and pulled him behind a car, cursing as he went.

A window shattered above their heads and Eliot's curses paused a moment as he grabbed Nate's arm and pulling him to keep moving. "Of course they wouldn't have bullet proof cars." He snarked shoving Nate behind a slightly more solid looking vehicle and looking around the corner at the shooter. "They're getting backup." Eliot whispered. "Have to stop them now."

Suddenly Eliot shoved Nate to the ground. "Get under the car. Stay still. Don't move until I say." He said, his voice suddenly strangly calm. "They realized we aren't ar-" The window by them shattering cut him off. He gasped slightly, shock registering on his face for a moment as he pressed a hand to the bullet wound now in his side.

He looked down at Nate, who'd been moving to do as told but was beginning to surge up to help the now injured man.

The look in those terrifying blue eyes stopped him. There was no pain, fear, or shock anymore. No recognition anymore.

Eliot dropped his hand from the wound, turning away to punch the guard who'd come around the corner a little too eagerly. He moved fast, too fast for Nate to even follow, and the guard was on the ground beside Nate, broken and bleeding in a dozen places.

Eliot turned to look back at Nate, his set expression not even hinting at changing. "Stay down."

Nate rolled over to slip underneath the car and stared into the dark space above him for only two heartbeats.

Then the screaming began.


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes:**Second to last instalment (only the epilouge left). I am actually really happy with this. My only issue is that a major point is never really addressed. Then again there was never really any point either of them could adress it and it's good news for the rest of you since it means there will likely be a resulting story where it is adressed.

* * *

**Cell Number Eight**

****

* * *

Later Nate wouldn't be sure how long he lay under the car, learning a whole new definition of fear to the soundtrack of cries of shock turned into shouts of fear and screams of pain. He didn't dare look out to the side, didn't dare try to see what was going on. Eliot had told him to lay under here and stay still and Nate had a feeling that doing so was the only reason he might survive this.

Then the garage went a quiet, deadly still.

Slowly Nate moved to one side, sitting up on the side of the car where they'd taken cover. Carefully he stood, looking through the shattered window.

Eliot stood in the middle of the garage floor, his hands, arms, torso, and even face splattered with blood, a long nasty looking knife he must had taken off a guard in one hand at his side. His eyes were closed, his face almost serene.

Cautiously Nate started to walk around the car toward him. As he turned the corner his foot kicked something and Nate looked down.

It was a hand, severed or maybe torn off a body.

Nate's stomach threatened to revolt as he looked up, seeing the sprawled bodies of eight guards lying scattered across the garage floor. Blood pooled, bits of body parts littered the floor between corpses, guns and knives no longer held by lifeless hands lay where they'd been dropped.

There was a clang of metal as the knife Eliot had been holding dropped to the floor. He turned around, his head moving slow as he absorbed what had happened.

He turned toward Nate, seeing him and relief spread across his face lasting only a second before Eliot's eyes skipped back to the carnage he'd just wrought.

There was terror in his eyes then and Nate wondered just how aware of himself Eliot had been.

Eliot's knees gave out beneath him, dropping him toward the floor to catch himself with his hands. He gave a little sound between a moan and a whimper, a hand moving to cover the bullet wound in his side like he was only just beginning to register the pain.

"Eliot?" Nate asked, alarmed. Yeah, okay the entire situation was a little beyond alarming but he was going to focus on what he **could** do and **could** deal with. Like Eliot, on his way to bleeding to death.

"Don't… not yet..." Eliot grunted trying to put pressure on the wound even as his whole body started to shake. Nate wasn't sure if he was going into shock or if what he'd just done was having this kind of effect on him. He tried to take some deep breaths but they came back out in a cough. "Get out of here." He said when he caught his breath. "Go!"

Nate froze. Eliot had told him to go and Nate had a feeling Eliot wasn't intending to come with him.

He didn't even get a chance to argue. Eliot's head dropped forward and a second later he'd collapsed, passing out.

Nate's panic raised a couple notches but this was no time for inaction. He moved forward, stripping the closet guard of his gun, keys, and jacket. Shouldering into the jacket and pocketing everything but the gun Nate headed for the garage doors. Finding the opening mechanism and recognizing a keycard system Nate was back to the bodies.

He fought down his own horror as he sorted through the bodies desperately, finally finding someone who looked uniformed as maybe the head of the night watch. He was rewarded with a keycard ID that should open the doors.

He raced to the door to the hallway, listening for any sign of men coming. Hearing nothing he ran back to Eliot. Their getaway was secure and it looked like Nate wouldn't have to get them gone before performing some first aid.

Nate still wasn't sure how he'd get a car started since, unlike Eliot, he didn't know how to hotwire a car, but he'd cross that bridge once he was sure Eliot wasn't bleeding out or when he heard guards coming. Whichever came first.

With limited knowledge and less experience there wasn't much Nate could really do. He did use the knife to cut strips from a mostly unbloodied jacket he'd taken off a slain guard and used them to bind the injury, managing to mostly stem off the flow of blood and hopefully stop Eliot from bleeding to death.

That task done Nate ran back to the door to the hallway, listening.

It felt like it had been hours but he guessed probably less than twenty minutes had passed since the fight. It wasn't long but he had to be running out of time.

Risking only another minute to see what else he could loot from another fallen body, he was rewarded with another set of keys, lighter, and a flask of something Nate was guessing was some kind of alcohol. Stowing all he could he raced across the garage to a car that had a window shot out by a bullet. He reached through and unlocked the doors before running back to Eliot.

He paused only a second, lifting the fallen man with surprising ease. It had ceased to register awhile ago but the boy was small for a fully grown man and weighed surprisingly little. Nate took it as a blessing since anything else would have meant he'd have to drag him, and carried Eliot over to the car, laying him in the back seat.

Nate climbed into the front seat, pulling out the sets of keys he'd taken off the guards. He couldn't think of anything else to do besides trial and error. As fast as he could he fit the keys into the key hole and turned before pulling it out and trying the next one.

Precious seconds ticked by with nothing. Nothing. More nothing.

He was starting to panic, positive he was going to be discovered at any moment, when he tried another key and the car roared to life.

Not pausing to thank god (but doing so as he went) he climbed out of the car and ran to the garage door, swiping the key card and starting the mechanism into motion.

Without waiting for it to open Nate ran back to the car, got in and drove.

He cleared the garage door and was met by open road.

The wind whistled in his hair through the broken window, stars shone brightly overhead, and he drove into the night. He wasn't sure where the hell he was but they were out. The rest he could deal with once they were safely farther away.

**oOo**

Consciousness returned slowly, though lucidity was a little longer in coming. His body ached and burned and pounded but like an echo and expectation rather than actuality and the closer he came to wakefulness the more the pained lessened.

Distantly Eliot wondered if he was finally dieing. If maybe the last two weeks had really been some huge hallucination as he was dieing and now it was over and he was done. Or maybe it was some kind of purgatory-limbo like place and he'd done his good deed and redeemed himself and any minute he'd start hearing angels sing.

Something in his head made a face at that. His catholic roots really chose odd times to make themselves known.

He drifted for a time, not aware of his surroundings but inching closer to reality. He hoped Nate was okay, if Nate wasn't some product of his frayed mental state. He absently tried to figure out where he'd have gotten the name Nate from anyway. The only thing he could come up with was a distant memory of his real father mentioning how he hoped someday Eliot would meet Nate, but his father had likely actually said Kate, which was the name of his father's dog.

Well, head trauma could do a job on your mind.

He faded out for awhile before fading in a little further. He was surprised the guards hadn't killed him yet. He hoped they weren't trying to keep him alive. That would suggest he was in for some unpleasantness that he frankly could survive without, or die without. He'd go with either one at this point.

He heard a voice talking distantly in the background, gentle, soothing. He was surprised but then he came to the conclusion that either Nate was a hallucination and he was starting to hallucinate again or Nate hadn't bailed when Eliot told him to.

In which case Eliot was going to have to wake up and make sure Nate stopped being an idiot and got home to his wife and kid.

He fought back the haze, rising back into lucidity the words "you idiot" not quite making it out of his throat with the same force he'd been going for.

A soft chuckle.

Damn that man.

Eliot forced his eyes open though the strangely bright lights made them water. He was lieing on a soft surface and he wasn't hurting as much as he should. He looked around, taking a long moment to recognize a hospital ward. A man neatly dressed in kakis and a button down shirt despite the heat stood nearby. It took Eliot a moment to recognize the man as Nate. He'd never seen him without several layers of grime, several days worth of stubble, and dressed only in pants that would likely never be clean again.

"Welcome back." Nate said with a friendly smile. "You're in a hospital in Cairo under the alias Mark Baker." Eliot blinked. "I'm your brother Tom. We were traveling together when we were taken hostage but we managed to escape. I already checked to make sure you don't have any outstanding warrants in Cairo or Egypt as a whole so you should be okay to stay here until your injuries heal."

Eliot looked around, not really liking how plainly Nate was talking until he realized he was in a room by himself.

"Before you ask IYS is footing the bill on the quiet. After I pointed out that you'd saved them the cost of my ransom and that they'd face a lot of public embarrassment for letting the situation be out of hand for so long they realized they could afford a hospital bill. Besides, you haven't really made their radar yet."

Eliot nodded again but couldn't quite put into words what was starting to really bother him now. The more lucid he became the more little details started to eat at him.

The way Nate was standing on the edge of the room, more distance separating them now than there had been for weeks.

The lights were too bright.

Nate was dressed sharply, like an insurance investigator should be. A pile of clothes sat on a nearby chair, blue jeans that were neither old nor new, and a non-descript, unmarked, dark blue tee-shirt. They were unremarkable and unmemorable, clothes that would blend in, help the wearer slip through the cracks and be forgotten. The clothes of a criminal.

The room smelled sanitary and clean, the smell of hospitals that he hated so much. The smell lingered on people who spent a long time here. It marked them. It permeated the air like violence permeated his life.

Nate was in explanation mode, in damage control and fixing mode. He'd set up an alias and worked the system and whatnot. It could be taken as the act of a friend but it had more the flavor of the repayment of a favor and Eliot couldn't help notice that even though their cover was as brothers it would mean there'd be no record of them having been friends.

After all, Nate was an insurance man. Eliot was a criminal. Out here, outside the walls of cell number eight, they couldn't be friends.

Silence lingered a long moment before Nate spoke, his voice softened with regret. "I'm glad you woke up. I have a flight back to the states in a couple of hours. I was worried I wouldn't get to talk to you before then." He shifted his weight, licking his lips, trying to figure out how to start this. "Eliot… you understand we ca-"

"We aren't friends." Eliot finished for him, mentally blaming any hoarseness on his throat. "Not out here. We can't be." Nate nodded. "They could send you after me and then what'd we do?"

There was a long silence before Nate spoke. "If they do, I'm going to pretend this never happened." Eliot wasn't sure how to take that when Nate spoke. "I know stuff about you, your life, things you want and care about. Things I learned as your friend. If we can't be friends I won't use what I learned as yours."

Eliot let out a long breath. "Me neither. If we come up against eachother it'll be fair." He gave a half bitter smirk. "Honorable, white knight verses black knight may the best man win."

Nate nodded. The silence stretched on a long moment before Nate finally turned to go gather up his stuff. Eliot found his voice. "Nate?" Nate looked over his shoulder and nodded, indicating he was listening. "We'll owe each other a favor. Anything happens to your family, ever need a hitter, I'll see that it isn't too hard for you to let me know."

Nate nodded and looked back to what he was doing. "If you're ever arrested overseas" He shook his head a little. "I would offer you help in getting transferred to a less brutal prison but you'd probably break out before you'd need my help." Eliot just shrugged.

Nate finished getting his things in order and picked up his briefcase. He turned back to Eliot, a newspaper and boarding pass in his hand. "I figure you'll be back on your feet and out of here in no more than two weeks, knowing you probably less. This is a ticket out of the country for three weeks from now. I trust you'll be able to get your hands on a passport by then."

Eliot took the ticket offered, mentally rambling off the info for the safety deposit box he had three fake passports in. "Zagreb?" He asked, reading the ticket's destination. "You bought me a ticket to Croatia? You're sending me into a warzone."

Nate laid the newspaper down on top of Eliot's clothes. "It's a war for independence." Nate said. "And in that kind of fighting there are lots of people displaced. Lots of little sisters and mothers and families with nowhere left to go and no one looking out for them." Nate shrugged a little. "You've been fighting this long to save me. I'm just trying to give you someone else to protect until you can figure out what else you've got to hold onto."

Nate picked up the paper and started flipping through it. "You said you wanted to leave behind something besides a trail of bodies." He found a page and sat it in Eliot lap, a small article's headline read a that Croatian village had been slaughtered by opposing forces. "Maybe this isn't it, and you can't save them by yourself, but if anyone I know can do something it's you."

Eliot looked up at Nate incredulous. "You know I'm a bad guy right?"

Nate looked down at the paper and gave a sad smile. "Well, a bad guy might be the only good guy these people get." He looked up, meeting Eliot's eyes and holding them. "Besides, you're a criminal, but your not a bad person. You're a good man who's learned how to survive in a world of evil men. That makes you something extraordinary. Never forget that."

Eliot didn't know what to say to that.

He looked down at the paper in his lap. A gentle hand rested on his head for a minute and Eliot closed his eyes, whisked back years earlier. The last time he'd seen his real father he had done the same thing.

The hand moved away and Eliot heard the door to the room open and shut.

Slowly Eliot reached over, hiding the ticket in the clothes left for him, smiling when he saw a Croatian phrasebook under the pile. He put the newspaper back as well and laid back, closing his eyes. He'd rest up, heal, learn what he could from the book, and in three weeks he'd head to Croatia and do what he could.

After that he didn't know, but he'd figure it out as he went.


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes:** Well this is it. The last little epilouge. Think of this as the little bit that sometimes comes after the closing credits. Just a little extra to wrap up and give it a final feel.  
Also, at the start of this shindig I asked if anyone could Catch That Refference with the title. The title is a sort of homage to my first really positive experience with Fanfiction. Somewhere out there is a site called The Mellon Chronicles written by Cassia and Siobhan, they're a long series of fanfics about Aragon and Legolas based on the concept that they met shortly after Aragon turned twenty and became close friends, companions, and partners in misadventure for the many years between then and the start of Lord of the Rings. The title (Cell Number Eight) is a refference to a fanfic by the same name which (like my own fic) took place almost completely inside a Cell whose number was eight and was mostly about a growing father son relationship (though in that case it was between Legolas and a young boy). As a Lord of the Rings geek I couldn't help myself and do apologies.

* * *

**Cell Number Eight  
**_Epilouge_

* * *

Two years. It was almost two years to the day after he last saw Nathan Ford that Eliot checked the address scribbled on a scrap of paper, paid the cab driver, and climbed out of the cab. He shouldered his black duffle that held what was left of his worldly possession without flinching despite the still healing wounds that peppered his body.

The war was over, even if he hadn't been in the actual final fight. He'd done what he could, fought hard, helped the rebels press toward liberation, protected the people caught in between, and paid more than his fair pound of flesh for the cause.

It had been worth it. Somewhere out there in the blood and carnage and sweat and war, somewhere out there he'd saved a life instead of ending it, made a difference, found what he was looking for.

Even if he hadn't known what he was looking for before and didn't know what he'd found now. But he knew that somewhere out there he'd figured out where his road would take him next. Where it should have taken him a long time ago.

He more limped than walked up the long pathway across the huge yard, forcing himself to put one foot in front of the other. He'd come straight here from the war zone, not slowing down until he was mounting the front porch steps. He was on his last legs but he hoped he could soon lay down and rest for a little while.

He knocked on the front door and waited, leaning against the side of the doorframe and trying not to think about what would happen if he got turned away. He wouldn't be turned away.

He really hoped he wouldn't.

A pretty young woman in her mid twenties answered the door with a smile, her eyebrows furrowing at the sight of him. She looked a long moment, then slowly the smile on her face widened. "Elie…"

"Hey Joey." Eliot said weakly. "I uhh…. I'm home?" He shifted his weight uneasily, trying to find the least painful position to stand in and hide his discomfort and worry.

Joey turned away and Eliot let out a slow sigh. So she was still turning him away.

Then she bent down to pick something up from behind her. When she turned back she was holding a small toddler who'd been hiding behind her legs. The boy looked toward Eliot with wide blue eyes just like his mothers and Joey pushed open the screen door, holding the boy out toward Eliot. "Big brother? I'd like you to meet your nephew Eliot."

**oOo**

Two years to the day from when he'd parted ways with the man named Eliot Spencer returned home from work to find a package waiting for him with the day's mail. It had a handwritten return address, but no indication to who it was that actually sent it.

He was trying to consider if he should even take it in the house or call IYS in case a mark had thought to take payback when he glanced at the return address. Zagreb, P.O. Box 824.

Nate knew where he recognized the handwriting from now.

He took the mail and package inside, greeting Maggie and Sam with a kiss and a hug, chatting a few moments before finding his way up the stairs to his study.

He sat the bills on his desk and slowly, carefully, opened the package.

Inside was a small magnetic travel chessboard with a single slip of paper with three simple words. "White moves first. –E.S."

Nate spent two days trying to decide if he'd do just that. It had been two years without any sort of contact. It had been two years since they'd made the clear decision not to be friends.

But this wasn't friends. This was chess by mail.

He was staring at the chess set when Sam toddled in and held up his arms in the usual clear sign he wanted to be picked up.

Nate leaned over, pulling the boy up and settling him in his lap. Sam reached out a small hand toward the chess set. "Horsy."

Nate picked up the white knight and put it in Sam's hand. "It's called a Knight. It moves in L shapes, three in a straight line then two left or right." Sam looked at the piece and then started babbling to himself about the horses and knight's adventures, clearly uninterested in the mechanics of a chess game. "That's alright." Nate muttered. "You're still a little young for chess."

Nate looked back toward the chess board, thinking, smiling softly. "Hey Sam. You're probably not going to understand this, but I want you to know. Somewhere out there you've got a big brother named Eliot, running around in a dangerous world. He's a criminal, and maybe a bad guy, but there's a village in Croatia that's still standing because he helped the people learn to defend themselves. There's a woman somewhere out in the world who survived to adulthood because your big brother was hers. Two years ago he was the reason I came home to you. He saved my life."

Sam was looking at Nate, wide eyed and in awe. "I gonna meet my brother?" Sam asked.

Nate sighed moving the other knight for his first move. "In a perfect world you would." Though he knew in a perfect world Eliot Spencer would be whoever he had been born as, would have grown up in a safe home, wouldn't have become a hitter, would be married to his childhood sweet heart, and would never have spent two weeks in some Cell outside of Cairo.

In a perfect world Nate wouldn't have either.

But Nate looked down at his son and grinned. "But when you're older and I teach you how to play chess you can play it with him."

Sam nodded solemnly before moving back to playing with his little knight, snatching another piece from the board.

Later, after going out and sending a letter with his own first move to the return address, Nate was walking back up to his study when he heard laughter coming from the living room. He leaned against the doorway watching as the little boy played with his horses and army men, playing out a miniature war staring his favorite action figure who was leading the toys to defend their homes.

He had just turned around, heading back upstairs to go back to work, when he heard Sam speak for the village toys one more time. "Thanks Eli't you saved us!"

He paused on the stairs and glanced upwards, lips moving to repeat the prayer he'd uttered two years ago. "Protect my sons."


End file.
